Weekend Download №88

Platform: Windows

All three games featured this week seem to be a bit on the chilling creepy eerie ominous side of things. Nothing like hordes of zombies leaping from behind locked doors, more like quiet, haunting environments that are suspiciously empty but filled with cautious intrigue...

The Mirror Lied(Windows, 7MB, free) - A spooky, horror-themed RPG that plays more like a top-down room escape game. It's rich in ambiguity, and as you start you're treated to some cryptic phrases before waking up in a dark, empty house. Move around the rooms interacting with the objects and gathering items to solve the game's simple puzzles. It's a short experience, only half an hour or so, but worth it for the atmosphere alone.

Takishawa is Dead(Windows, 2.3MB, free) - A short, simple, and unpolished 3D platformer created using Game Maker by Andrew Brophy. The art style makes it a treat to see, and even though the game itself is rather standard, it's a good experience and feels different enough to be entertaining. Use the [Z] key to read text and talk to people, [X] to jump, the [arrow] keys to move and [WASD] to switch camera angles.

Somnia(Windows, 30MB, free) - A demo for a game in the works from Cryptic Sea, Somnia is a 3D game that's all about light and shadow. Move around the nightmarish world using standard first person controls, but when you stand on a ledge, take note of where your shadow falls. If it touches another object's shadow, you can use the left mouse button to switch to a 2D "shadow mode" that allows you to gain access to other parts of the world. Roll about in shadow mode, and when you revert to 3D, you'll appear wherever your shadow was. When the mechanic clicks, it's one of those ah-HA! moments I love to experience in a game.

Note: All games have been confirmed to run under Windows Vista and are virus-free. Mac users should try Boot Camp, Parallels, or CrossOver Games to play Windows titles, Linux users can use Wine. If you know of a great game we should feature, use the Submit link above to send it in!

I thought The Mirror Lied was great. The atmosphere was great thanks to some wonderfully placed music. I would like to see more games like that if a little longer. Takishawa is Dead was a little annoying. The artistic design worked well but parts of it are frustrating. Im about to try Somnia so wish me luck.

I don't care whether games work on Windows Vista. People have restored Windows XP because Vista is simply (let's keep it civil) BAD. It would be much more helpful if you told us whether games work for commonly used operating systems.

And please get rid of the annoying IE 6 banner or at least make it removable. If I'm using IE, it's because Firefox and Chrome aren't working properly.

@MacGuyver: Just because you don't care whether it runs on Vista doesn't mean no one does (I definitely care, and appreciate that it's been specified, so thanks, John). They're far more likely to run on XP no matter what simply because, as you said, more people still use it - similarly, more games run on PC's than Macs.

MacGyverMagic: Well, I'm sorry you don't care! Like Cat said, isn't it reasonable to assume that if the game runs on Vista, it runs on XP? More people report Vista problems than any other OS, which is why I say "these work on Vista". I run Vista and Linux, not XP, so I feel I'm covering a good base of potential problems with that last paragraph.

And in regards to the IE banner. I have no clue what you're talking about.

none of these games work for me. specifically TML won't extract properly, TID says the file doesn't exist, and Somnia says i need OpenGL 2.0. i have vista and i've tried multiple browsers both yesterday and today. oh well.

I run Vista. I also run XP on another computer. Diddums you hate Vista, but some people run that because they do not have the time nor money to remove it when it's already on their system. Vista has actually served me better than XP.

Stop being so selfish and bratty and demanding that the reviewers don't notify readers on specific systems. Instead, be a bit more polite and ask if it runs on XP? Which it presumably will.

Ignoring the Vista/Xp debate and going back to the matter in hand I thought Mirror Lied was a great story/game/experiment (not brilliant but very very good). The controls and mechanics were slightly frustrating but it seems fairly early on that you realise it's not what the 'game' is all about.

It's interesting our reaction to a game which is dressed up to be something (RPG) but is actually something else. The unsettling feeling went nicely with the story.

I don't think - "think" being the operative word - that The Mirror Lied had multiple endings. On which note, I really rather enjoyed it, but I do tend to enjoy that sort of thing. Anyone have any screwy theories on what it all meant? I have a couple - good old

nuclear war. birdie=plane carrying bombs. see how continents gradually disappear from the map? it's at about same time the phone guy says the birdie flies over them. that's why the house burns at some point.

Apparently some anti-virus softwares have placed all RM(XP?) created game files (Game.exe in particular) into the malware category because in the past, one Game.exe from a RM created package was found rotten.

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